Clay Wilson was a young inventor who worked as a teacher's assistant at Empire State University. Desiring money and power, Clay stole a professor's experimental force field device and crafted an armor using the technology to become the super-villain known as Force. Defeated by Namor, Clay barely managed to escape and desperate for the resources to rebuild his armor, agreed to work for Justin Hammer as one of his super-powered henchmen.
While working for Hammer, Clay fought the hero Iron Man. But most of his time was spent attacking cargo ships owned by Hammer's rivals. Many people died on these attacks, causing Force to regret the choice he made working for Hammer. Turning against his handlers, Justin Hammer activated a failsafe function put into his armor that rendered Force mute and unable to remove it, without being killed by a lethal power surge.
Contacting Iron Man and convincing him that he meant him no harm, Force was freed from his armor. Accepting Clay's desire to escape his life of crime and having fought off a trio of super-powered assassins (Beetle, Whiplash, and Blizzard) sent to kill Clay so that he would not implicate Hammer as his boss, Iron Man decided to fake Clay's death and created a new identity of him, as Carl Walker.
Under a new identity, Carl Walker, he began working as an employee of Barstow Electronics. Clay freely gave up his armor for Iron Man to study. Stark learned that the designs incorporated his own technology and angrily confronted Walker. Walker confirmed that Hammer had given him the designs, leading to the Armor Wars and was angrily confronted by Stark one night over the deaths Walker caused as a Hammer minion.
Years later Barstow was commissioned to work for a Pentagon contract. Background checks revealed Walker's past, and he was blackmailed into working on appropriated Stark Armors. Walker was also falsely told that Stark had "outed" him as part of his appointment as Secretary of Defense. Stark explained he was not responsible, and the two defeated Vitriol through Stark's government job as Secretary of Defense, Walker was given a full pardon for his past crimes. Walker later worked with Stark on his plan to outfit all US armed forces with Iron Man technology, including combat training with a cavalry unit.
Force Armor: Walker uses the Force armor. The armor uses powerful forcefields and force beams, as well as generating an EMP. While the original version was given to Stark, Walker built a new version and has used it on occasion recently.
Pardoned from his crimes as Force, identity changed to protect himself and his family from Justin Hammer, and his identity is known to some government officials.